In what could be every woman's dream, Adobe has created the first digital dress: the interactive dress that changes patterns, hailing an era of infinite style possibilities. That last part paraphrases Adobe's official introduction of Project Primrose, which is what they're calling this dress.
Project Primrose made its debut at the Adobe MAX conference in October 2023.
It's a piece of garment that sits at the intersection between technology and the textile industry, combining both to create a piece that is dynamic and, as such, infinitely versatile and hopefully sustainable. If the need to change looks is partly what fuels the industry of fast fashion, an item like Primrose could easily replace several other dresses by simply changing colors and patterns and thus discourage waste.
At the October event, Project Primrose was still more like a concept, but it has since been completed and turned into a wearable, high-fashion garment with help from designer Christian Cowan. In fact, earlier this week, Primrose made its catwalk debut at Christian Cowan's FW24 collection at New York Fashion Week.
Photo: Adobe/Christian Cowan
If the official introduction of Primrose was for the geeks, the Fashion Week debut of the same dress in a more wearable form is for the women who are supposed to be wearing it. Cowan put a more feminine and decidedly more flattering spin on the dress, adding a skirt made of stars, a mesh neckline and matching mesh elbow-length gloves.
Development on Project Primrose goes back to 2013 when Adobe was experimenting with the idea of a sweater that would reflect weather changes. The ready-to-wear version of the dress included 1,264 laser-cut polymer dispersed liquid crystal “petals,” while the skirt was made of 14 stars. Both are dynamic, so they can create different patterns and flows, as shown in the two videos at the bottom of the page.
Project Primrose co-developer (and initial Primrose model) Christine Dierk worked with Christian Cowan on the finished dress. Under the "petals" is a flexible printed circuit board that uses Adobe After Effects animations to give this dynamic quality to the dress. To map out the circuit board, Dierk used Adobe Illustrator.
Photo: Adobe/Christian Cowan
"With Primrose, traditional clothing, once static, can now be transformed into dynamic expressions of art and technology," Gavin Miller, head of Adobe Research, says of Project Primrose.
"I hope the big takeaway is that fashion doesn’t have to be static – it can be dynamic and interactive. I hope it inspires people in technology and fashion design, and anyone who does making," Dierk adds.
Adobe doesn't say anything of plans to bring this digital dress to market, but the fact that Primrose remains a one-off and given that the tech is too new, we're thinking it would be too expensive even for showbiz royalty. That said, the Academy Awards are coming up. The Oscar red carpet would be the perfect stage for something as futuristic and rare as this. The dress would have to be longer, which would take more work and more money, but the media coverage would be insane, so it'd be worth it.
Elena has been writing for a living since 2006 and, as a journalist, she has put her double major in English and Spanish to good use. She covers automotive and mobility topics like cars and bicycles, and she always knows the shows worth watching on Netflix and friends. Full profile
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